Morales 2 for 3 in Cactus comeback

Playing against major-league competition for the first time since fracturing his left ankle on May 29, 2010, Kendrys Morales was 2 for 3 and scored a run in the Angels' 7-4 win over the Kansas City Royals Thursday afternoon.

The switch-hitting Morales batted right-handed in his first two at-bats (against Royals left-hander Danny Duffy) and had a ground-ball single through the right side of the infield and a pop out to first base. In his third at-bat, Morales batted left-handed against former Angels right-hander Sean O'Sullivan and had a single through the middle of the infield.

"We reached a step we wanted to today," Morales said through a translator. "Everything felt good and hopefully we can keep it going."

After his first single, Morales went from first base to third base on Bobby Abreu's double down the left-field line, reaching safely with a slide. That was similar to a first-to-home test Morales passed during one of his three appearances in minor-league camp games leading up to Thursday's return.

"I thought it was terrific," Angels manager Mike Scioscia said of Morales' Cactus League debut. "It was what we expected. That's what he's looked like in camp games."

Morales is scheduled to play again Friday (in the Angels' night game against the Cleveland Indians) and then the Angels will evaluate his availability for the weekend.

Meanwhile, Angels starter Jered Weaver had an unimpressive outing against the Royals, allowing all four of their runs on nine hits (one by each Royals starter including a mammoth two-run home run by Lorenzo Cain) in 4 2/3 innings.

Scioscia said Weaver might be going through "a bit of a dead-arm phase" at this point in spring. But Weaver dismissed the poor results, saying only that he hadn't been happy with his fastball command yet this spring but made some progress as Thursday's game went along.

"That's going to happen in spring -- those numbers aren't going to show up on the back of your baseball card," Weaver said.

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